


Going on the Account

by Ithika



Series: Remorseless [3]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Gen, History and speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-11-10
Packaged: 2018-05-12 19:37:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5678125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ithika/pseuds/Ithika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The meeting of Charles Vane and Edward Teach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Charles.

**Worthless.** That was the word that had done it - or rather, that had _un_ done everything; the final crack that set the levee he’d built to dam his rage to crumbling.

It had been a hard five years aboard the _Ardent_ , but the young man was resilient and stubborn, and he’d weathered the hard work, disciplinary beatings, and even the often cruel mockery of the crew. He wasn’t the boy who had escaped from slavery by his own wit and the skin of his teeth any longer, he was something else now: a man with letters, who understood the sea and the ships that rode it; who could read charts and stars and, increasingly, men.

A taste for violence, though - a burning, ravenous hunger for blood and _satisfaction_ drove him like nothing else. Were it not for that - the devil that reared its head whenever a blade was pressed into his hand, whenever the privateer brig kissed hulls with a Spanish vessel - were it not for **that** , perhaps the boy Vane would have found friends among the crew despite his otherness. 

But it was not to be. 

Rage was as much a part of him as the blood and bones that formed his body, and he knew - he  _understood_  that he had to be more than his rage. Captain Jennings had made that clear, tried to direct the lad’s sharp mind to other tasks, to give him pride and purpose, to lessen the fear he saw behind those pale blue eyes.  The fear that he was, and would ever be, replaceable. A _thing;_ nothing more than a tool that would be discarded when its usefulness was spent. 

It had worked; Vane thirsted to prove himself, to excel. To be _more than_. But the rest of the crew did not have the patience or the vision, perhaps, that their captain had, and when he had left, turning pirate to sail with Sam Bellamy, things had changed for the boy. 

No more lessons with sextant and stars in last dog watch; no more charts or knots; gone too were the books and their letters and numbers. The new captain looked through Charles, the quartermaster down at him. The boatswain, new from a different vessel, enjoyed tormenting the former slave, jealous of what little letters the boy had (for he practiced at them at dog or first watch, when the ship and sea grew quiet). 

He _had_ tried. He had tried not to listen. Tried, as his captain had suggested, to box the compass in his head. “It will never stop,” he’d said abruptly once, while setting a course in the state room as Charles watched. Jennings’ steady hand walked the divider calipers across the northern shoreline of Green Turtle Cay as he spoke. “Not until you can force them to. You’re young yet - so you’ll have to learn another way.” 

The boatswain was a cruel drunk, and well into his cups one evening as Vane had made his way to the galley for supper. Vane did his best - his _very_ best - not to listen. Tried to enjoy his bread and broth quickly, so that he could make his way to the hammocks below and snatch some sleep before his next watch began. The man was loud, though. 

“Jennings was a soft touch—” 

_North. North by east. North-northeast. Northeast by north._

“—loved his **projects**.” 

_Northeast. Northeast by east. East-northeast. East by north. East._

“Remember that fuckin’ parrot? At least that was—” 

_East by south. East-southeast. Southeast. Southeast by… Sou’east by…_

“—entertaining. A thing of _beauty,_  that bird—-”

_Southeast by south. Southeast by south._

“—thing of **value**.” Laughter, and not just from _him._  “Learned to talk, ate from your hand—”

_South-southeast. South by east…_ He looked up from his super, glaring at the hated bo’s’n over his food, knife twisting in his hand. Turning, turning the worn wooden handle in his palm. He couldn’t remember the next point. Brown eyes looked back at him from across the deck, chapped lips smirking as they threw their taunts.

“—far more entertaining than a **worthless** , lackwit slave boy too weak to—”

The knife was dull and short, but it didn’t matter. The fifteen-year-old was gangling and rangy, but that didn’t matter, either - the brawny man was slowed by drink and underestimation. His throat was soft and vulnerable, and breached by the little blade almost before any of the men at table had time to notice the lad had finally snapped.  

“Only **dead men**  are **worthless** , you fucking—” Charles had snarled this in his face as bright red blood fought free of the wound, knife sinking ever deeper behind the force of his fist. He didn’t get to finish, a large fist knocking the boy out cold in one sound wallop. 

* * *

He knew before he opened his eyes where he was, but he opened them anyway. 

The rope was rough against his wrists, his arms wrapped tight about the foremast. He could feel the kiss of the wind against the bare skin of his back, feel the warmth of the sun tingle along his skin. The lash had not awoken him - he was glad, at least, for that. 

"I don't regret it."

His young voice rang loud, clear, unafraid. Charles could hear the lie in it, but he was proud of the way it held steady nonetheless. He knew the whip too well to be truly free of fear, but if this was to be the way he died - at least he knew he’d taken that bastard with him. 

He didn’t cry out - instead biting down on cheeks until he tasted blood, fingers digging into the old timber of the mast until they, too, stung. What was a little more spilt in place of his pride? Blackness took him eventually, and when he woke again, it was to throbbing pain, not the white-sharp bite of the lash, and canon fire. 

 


	2. Edward.

The _Ranger_ was a good ship, fast and heavily armed, despite being smaller than the galleon they hunted. Edward counted three gun decks on the slow-moving square-rigger, but that was fine. _Ranger_ had thirty cannon bristling from her gunwales, spread across her two decks, and her fore-and-aft rigging freed a good number of the men to ready the guns.

Her Jackstaff bore the navy, red and white of the British, but this gave the pirate no never mind - he knew Ben wouldn’t approve, but then, Ben wasn’t here, was he? When he’d left Edward with the _Ranger_ and a full compliment of sailors, the elder man had hardly stipulated that Teach was to abide by his personal standards for faux-privateering, and the black-haired captain was not of a mind to. The men wanted a prize, and he was eager to add some more blood to the growing legend of his sigil.

The British ship was a privateer in the end - that explained her refusal to strike, even after the pirate had displayed her far greater armament. The fight was short and as bloody as these things always are, a small number of the crew surrendering once the fight was done.

Israel came to find his captain as Edward was considering the problem of his captives - he owed them no quarter, particularly, but he was certain that there were better ways to use their surrender than washing the deck with their blood.

A good man and a good friend was Israel Hands, and when he spoke, Teach listened. Not that he had a great deal to say, generally - the man was reticent compared to the verbose orator he called captain.

"‘S a lad lashed to the fore side of the foremast, Cap’n."

"Alive, I take it?"

"Aye, sir. Good and licked, but very much so - looks to have a lot of fight in him yet, despite the stripes."

Edward doesn’t reply, instead walking briskly aforeships to the figure he’d failed to pick out during the fray. The boy was young, but already bore his share of wiry muscle, his young skin tanned the colour of oiled teak. And _scarred_ \- through the drying streaks of blood that festooned his back, it was clear that the fresh lashes were not his first. And the boy was standing - awake, he hadn’t sagged against his bonds, as many would. No, his feet were planted, and Edward pulls his belt knife, moving to cut the bonds that had lashed him to the mast. Partially to see his face, and to see if the lad would fall in the absence of support.

He didn’t fall. 

There’s more than a little stagger that accompanies his release from his bonds, but it takes the young man little time to recover, turning on his heel to face Edward the second he finds his feet, fists balled. There is a cold, furious fire in that blanched blue glare, challenge and rage, and above all else a vibrant, unmistakable will to live.

The boy doesn’t speak, and he doesn’t lower his fists, though Edward is large, strong, fully grown and spattered with blood - though of course, it is a good question as to whether the boy would care to find his tormentors dead and dismembered. He rather doubted it.

"They call me Blackbeard." It’s not much by way of greeting, but the boy looked more than half feral, and bore a slaver’s brand. Perhaps the lad didn’t speak.

 _"They_ don’t call me anything. My name is Charles Vane." The boy’s voice is every ounce as **defiant** as his glare, and Teach’s whiskers twitch with a smile.

"This is my ship now. How did you earn that flogging?"

The boy’s glare never falters, though his chin lifts in defiance. "Boatswain called me worthless. Only dead men is worthless–" He pauses. " _Are_ worthless. I _ain’t_. So I put my paring knife in his fuckin’ throat."

Edward’s laugh is chest-deep and booming, unaccountably delighted by the boy’s response. Those angry eyes narrow to slits at the sound of mirth, and Edward stills. "Good for you, lad."   
  
Fingers grimy with blood and dirt scratch thoughtfully at a likewise soiled beard. He liked the boy - such indomitable spirit in the face of hardship and danger was something he couldn’t help but admire, and despite their obvious differences - Edward is quite certain he’s never uttered the word “ain’t” in his life - he sees something of himself in this scrawny, savage thing before him.

"On my ship," he begins, the deep timbre of his cultured voice carrying easily between them, "all men are equal. Brothers who toil equally towards a common goal - profit. We bow to no kings, pray to no gods, and are beholden to no one. A man’s worth is determined by his deeds.  It isn’t an easy life, but it is as free as any you’ll find under this sky. Sail with me, _prove_ your worth.

And Charles," He pauses, considering him with a stern eye, "I will only make this offer once."


	3. 3. Charles

He was a giant of a man. Larger in every way than Jennings had been, though Charles had never seen his former mentor painted in the blood of battle. And the way he looked at him; he’d seemed curious. As if he wanted to see what Charles could do, as if he thought that what he could do was something. Something worthwhile. In those clear, pale eyes Charles saw what he wanted most of all, though he never admitted it to himself - value. This man thought he had value of some kind, and that was all the boy needed.

It hurt to raise his hand, but raise it he did. Men sealed compacts with handshakes, and the boy was determined that he be seen as such, particularly by this man before him, if he was to be his captain. The pirate had laughed again, and took his smaller hand in his, and much to his surprise Charles felt no rage at his mirth. “Welcome to the account, Charles Vane.”

* * *

 

Vane took to life among the buccaneers as easy as breathing. The men of Nassau were unlike any he’d met before now. He’d known cruel men in that place where he was made, that place where sawdust stuck in his ears and nostrils, itched in his hair and between his toes. He’d felt his first taste of kindness and pride aboard the  _ Ardent _ , though for the most part the privateers found him broken, an Englishman raised without England. But these men - when they called him half-wild, or savage, or mad, it was ever with a grin, pride, camaraderie. Many of the men of Providence, Vane thought, could be described as half-wild or savage. 

But not Teach. Teach, somehow, was different again, but he didn’t try to school Charles out of his wildness, as Jennings had. He put sword and pistol in his hands and bade him use that wildness, hone it into something useful. Something to be proud of, something for other men to fear. Something of such worth that it set him apart from the others, in Teach’s eyes. 

“We are different, you and I,” Edward had said to his protege as they looked out over the glittering water, sea spray taking the baking heat from the day. Charles simply turned to look up at him - for though he was fully a man now, and taller than many, it seemed Teach would forever be somehow larger than any other, as if the force of his spirit lent his frame presence that other men simply did not possess. And he was fine with that. 

“But we are the same in the way that matters most. We know what we want, and we know what we are.” 

Vane’s laugh doesn’t boom, as Teach’s does. It is a rough, gruff thing, all function and no polish, much like the man who made it. “Yes. Freedom. And we are both free.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it for now!

**Author's Note:**

> Based on creative adjustment of the histories to accommodate show canons, and some speculation.


End file.
